TY - JOUR
T1 - Coniochaeta elegans sp. Nov., coniochaeta montana sp. nov. and coniochaeta nivea sp. nov., three new species of endophytes with distinctive morphology and functional traits
AU - Arnold, A. Elizabeth
AU - Harrington, Alison H.
AU - Huang, Yu Ling
AU - U'ren, Jana M.
AU - Massimo, Nicholas C.
AU - Knight-Connoni, Victoria
AU - Inderbitzin, Patrik
N1 - Funding Information: We thank the National Science Foundation for supporting studies that led to the isolation and identification of Coniochaeta endophytes from diverse hosts (NSF DEB-1045766, DEB-1541496 and DEB-2030192) and for support in the form of a Graduate Research Fellowship to AHH. We also thank the Mycological Society of America for support of endophyte biodiversity surveys (JMU). Funding Information: We thank the National Science Foundation for supporting studies that led to the isolation and identification of Coniochaeta endophytes from diverse hosts (NSF DEB-1045766, DEB-1541496 and DEB-2030192) and for support in the form of a Graduate Research Fellowship to AHH. We also thank the Mycological Society of America for support of endophyte biodiversity surveys (JMU). We thank the School of Plant Sciences, the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS) at the University of Arizona for supporting this study. We further thank CALS for supporting the Robert L. Gilbertson Mycological Herbarium. We are especially grateful to J. Miadlikowska and F. Lutzoni for helpful revisions of alignments, discussion, and participation in field collections, and to M. Lee, J. Carey, and C. Plecki for laboratory assistance. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Authors.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - A growing interest in fungi that occur within symptom-less plants and lichens (endophytes) has uncovered previously uncharacterized species in diverse biomes worldwide. In many temperate and boreal forests, endophytic Coniochaeta (Sacc.) Cooke (Coniochaetaceae, Coniochaetales, Sordariomycetes, Ascomycota) are commonly isolated on standard media, but rarely are characterized. We examined 26 isolates of Coniochaeta housed at the Gilbertson Mycological Herbarium. The isolates were collected from healthy photosynthetic tissues of conifers, angiosperms, mosses and lichens in Canada, Sweden and the United States. Their barcode sequences (nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer and 5.8S; ITS rDNA) were ≤97% similar to any documented species available through GenBank. Phylogenetic analyses based on two loci (ITS rDNA and translation elongation factor 1-alpha) indicated that two isolates represented Coniochaeta cymbiformispora, broadening the ecological niche and geographic range of a species known previously from burned soil in Japan. The remaining 24 endophytes represented three previously undescribed species that we characterize here: Coniochaeta elegans sp. nov., Coniochaeta montana sp. nov. and Coniochaeta nivea sp. nov. Each has a wide host range, including lichens, bryophytes and vascular plants. C. elegans sp. nov. and C. nivea sp. nov. have wide geographic ranges. C. montana sp. nov. occurs in the Madrean biome of Arizona (USA), where it is sympatric with the other species described here. All three species display protease, chitinase and cellulase activity in vitro. Overall, this study provides insight into the ecological and evolutionary diversity of Coniochaeta and suggests that these strains may be amenable for studies of traits relevant to a horizontally transmitted, symbiotic lifestyle.
AB - A growing interest in fungi that occur within symptom-less plants and lichens (endophytes) has uncovered previously uncharacterized species in diverse biomes worldwide. In many temperate and boreal forests, endophytic Coniochaeta (Sacc.) Cooke (Coniochaetaceae, Coniochaetales, Sordariomycetes, Ascomycota) are commonly isolated on standard media, but rarely are characterized. We examined 26 isolates of Coniochaeta housed at the Gilbertson Mycological Herbarium. The isolates were collected from healthy photosynthetic tissues of conifers, angiosperms, mosses and lichens in Canada, Sweden and the United States. Their barcode sequences (nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer and 5.8S; ITS rDNA) were ≤97% similar to any documented species available through GenBank. Phylogenetic analyses based on two loci (ITS rDNA and translation elongation factor 1-alpha) indicated that two isolates represented Coniochaeta cymbiformispora, broadening the ecological niche and geographic range of a species known previously from burned soil in Japan. The remaining 24 endophytes represented three previously undescribed species that we characterize here: Coniochaeta elegans sp. nov., Coniochaeta montana sp. nov. and Coniochaeta nivea sp. nov. Each has a wide host range, including lichens, bryophytes and vascular plants. C. elegans sp. nov. and C. nivea sp. nov. have wide geographic ranges. C. montana sp. nov. occurs in the Madrean biome of Arizona (USA), where it is sympatric with the other species described here. All three species display protease, chitinase and cellulase activity in vitro. Overall, this study provides insight into the ecological and evolutionary diversity of Coniochaeta and suggests that these strains may be amenable for studies of traits relevant to a horizontally transmitted, symbiotic lifestyle.
KW - Biodiversity
KW - Boreal
KW - Ecology
KW - Endolichenic
KW - Lecythophora
KW - Madrean biome
KW - Novel species
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U2 - 10.1099/ijsem.0.005003
DO - 10.1099/ijsem.0.005003
M3 - Article
C2 - 34731078
SN - 1466-5026
VL - 71
JO - International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology
JF - International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology
IS - 11
M1 - 005003
ER -